4 Reasons Dentists Should Invest in Stocks – Episode #345

Dentists generally can invest in these asset classes: their practice (private business), real estate, and public markets. You’re already invested in your practice and location, to balance your assets, here’s why you need stocks.

On this Dentist Money™ Show, Ryan and Matt welcome Jake Elm, CFP® to talk about why stocks should be a part of your investments as you build wealth.

 

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Podcast Transcript

Ryan Isaac:
Hello everybody. And welcome back to another episode of the Dentist Money Show brought to you by Dentist Advisors, a no commission, comprehensive financial advisor, just for dentists all over the country. Check us out at dentistadvisors.com. Today on the show Matt and I are joined by dentist advisor extraordinaire Jake Elm. And today on the show we’re talking about investing and good habits in investing and how to have the proper mindset around investing in the stock market and what are some of the implications of the stock market going up and down.

Ryan Isaac:
What they mean for you and your portfolio and your strategy and what you should do. Many thanks to Jake for prepping for today and spending time with us. We did it in the studio. It’s super cool to have Jake on the show. Really grateful to him. If you have any questions for us, go to dentistadvisors.com. Click the ‘book free consultation’ link. Let’s have a chat about your situation. We’d love to talk with you and point you in the right direction. Thanks for being here everybody. Enjoy the show.

Announcer:
Consultant advisor conduct your own due diligence when making financial decisions. General principles discussed during this program do not constitute personal advice. This program is furnished by Dentist Advisors, a registered investment advisor. This is dentist money. Now here’s your host, Ryan Isaac.

Ryan Isaac:
Welcome to the Dentist Money Show where we help dentists make smart financial decisions. I am your moderator today. My name is Ryan and I’m here, of course, in studio… In studio, which is rare with the Hollywood Mountain, Matt Mulcock. What’s up, Matt?

Matt Mulcock:
Yo, Ryan. It feels so good to be sitting across from your physical body.

Ryan Isaac:
I know. Seeing each other in person. We’re also here with the illustrious, Mr. Jake over under Elm. [laughter] Jake, what is up Jake?

Matt Mulcock:
That’s a good one.

Jake Elm:
I could not be happier to be sitting in between you guys today. This feels great.

Ryan Isaac:
You have the awkward seat because, no one can see this, but we have… So in [chuckle] the studio, this is kind of a funny picture. There’s three chairs. We’re all facing basically the same direction. Even though I’ve tilted mine to look at you. We’re like all facing one wall and Jake’s in the middle. And then you have to like do the thing where…

Jake Elm:
Bounce back and forth. Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s, awkward in the middle because you have to speak into your microphone, but you have to look at the person you’re talking to, to your left and right. I was there the last time we did a panel and I didn’t like sitting there. So I took this seat.

[overlapping conversation]

Matt Mulcock:
I did notice that Ryan got down here first. We were upstairs talking and I was like, where did Ryan go.

Ryan Isaac:
Oldest host gets to pick the chair.

Matt Mulcock:
He [chuckle] came down and picked a chair. And then I came down second to make sure Jake sat middle. Sorry, Jake.

Ryan Isaac:
We’re gonna kick this off today with a little advice, Matt, can we say where this came from?

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. Came from…

Ryan Isaac:
Shout out.

Matt Mulcock:
Came from my dad.

Ryan Isaac:
Mr…

Matt Mulcock:
Mr. Tom.

Ryan Isaac:
Mr. Tom.

Matt Mulcock:
Tom Mulcock.

Ryan Isaac:
Mr. Tom Mulcock the original mountain. I don’t know how Hollywood he is, but he’s very…

Matt Mulcock:
He’s very Hollywood.

Ryan Isaac:
Okay.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. He looks like a Tom Selleck, an old Tom Selleck.

Ryan Isaac:
We’re recording this in June, 2022. We have some really interesting… We’re gonna talk about the market today. We’re gonna talk about some big questions people have right now and why it’s timely. We’ll get into all that, but we’re gonna kick this off with a little summertime. What would you call this? This is just like a well wish… Well wishes for everyone.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
Out there in Summerland.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. For a little context. I get this text every year.

Ryan Isaac:
Wait you’re…

Matt Mulcock:
Or some version of this text.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
Every single year, my whole family does. So this is yesterday. I don’t know when this is coming out, but it’s end of June. Yesterday was the first day of summer officially, shout out.

Ryan Isaac:
I love that this is…

Matt Mulcock:
Every year. I’m not kidding.

Ryan Isaac:
I love that your dad is so into this.

Matt Mulcock:
He’s very into it.

Ryan Isaac:
And we thank Mr. Tom, the original Hollywood Mountain for this.

Matt Mulcock:
So this is the text.

Ryan Isaac:
Okay.

Matt Mulcock:
To my whole family, “A glorious day, longest day of the year. Everything is roses. Unfortunately it changes tomorrow. And it’s so sad. Enjoy all the sunshine today for tomorrow there’s less. Love you all. Welcome to summer.” [laughter]

Jake Elm:
That’s like a poetic text message.

Matt Mulcock:
That is every year.

Ryan Isaac:
Whoa.

Matt Mulcock:
Some version of that.

Ryan Isaac:
Here’s what I like about that. I… You started reading it earlier, before we recorded, I said, wait. And that was actually the perfect intro to today’s topic.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
Because he’s pointing out something that is… I think it’s probably good human psychology and a good attitude, which is like, today’s a great day. Enjoy it. It’s gonna be different tomorrow.

Matt Mulcock:
Yep.

Ryan Isaac:
And it will be worse in some aspects than today. But what we know is that we know how it continues on from here, unless the world ends.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
We know that a year from now it’s another great day. Everything is gonna be roses. And it’s gonna be the longest day of the year, a year from now.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, exactly.

Ryan Isaac:
That’s kind of a cool intro.

Matt Mulcock:
It’s gonna come back around and I’m gonna get the text again.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. And, you get one in winter too. Right?

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. So that one is a little bit more somber. Well, so…

Jake Elm:
No, ’cause that one’s happier because in winter…

Ryan Isaac:
There’s both sides.

Matt Mulcock:
He likes that it’s…

Jake Elm:
It’s like, it is only up from here.

Matt Mulcock:
Exactly. Exactly. So December 21st, he’ll usually text out again and I’m not kidding.

Ryan Isaac:
Every year.

Matt Mulcock:
He tracks it every year and I’m getting a text on the 21st of December, basically something similar like, “Okay, well now days are getting longer.” We’re looking up from here and then June 21st, it’s a cycle.

Ryan Isaac:
Someone let us know if you’re also into summer and winter solstice. I’d love to hear who else is into that. Okay. So I… Funny how that turned out, I think that’s a really great intro to today’s topic. Today’s topic, like I said, is… Just has to do with the public stock market. Where we’re going with today is why it’s a good asset class. What’s the obvious… What’s the obvious point of conflict of interest here? We manage money for a living, [laughter] our firm is an investment advisor. So do we have a preference for the market? Yes. Do we have a business around investing in the market? Yes we do.

Matt Mulcock:
So can I say something to that real quick?

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
Because that is obviously true, but it’s kind of one of those things, like, is it chicken or the egg, right. So meaning do we manage money because we get paid to do it or do we manage money in the stock market because we believe in the stock market. We built our entire…

Ryan Isaac:
‘Cause it’s like a thing.

Matt Mulcock:
Business around the stock market because we believe in it.

Ryan Isaac:
So yeah, exactly. And like, is it, right? Is it wrong? Is it the best? Is it the worst? Those things aren’t… That’s not a real good way…

Matt Mulcock:
It’s the only true way.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Like what was on the Mandalorian? This is the way.

Jake Elm:
This is the way.

Matt Mulcock:
This is… Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
This is the way.

Jake Elm:
Yeah. We can talk about this today. Right there… We talk about it all the time. There is no one path to wealth, right? People do it in a ton of different ways. Some people have right personalities and preferences for a certain asset class. I just thought it would be fun today to talk about why stocks are a good asset class. Why it’s a good investment. Why it should be something you should be doing? I have a question for you guys. I’m just curious. If you had to guess. How many American adults do you think are invested in the stock market right now? What percentage of American…

Matt Mulcock:
As a percentage or like number of humans?

Jake Elm:
Yeah, percentage. No percentage. What would you guess?

Ryan Isaac:
Percentage of adults that are invested in the stock market.

Jake Elm:
Yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
That’s a good question.

Ryan Isaac:
Let’s say that it is 20%

Jake Elm:
20.

Matt Mulcock:
I will say… I’m gonna say higher than that, like have some exposure to the stock market.

Jake Elm:
Yeah, some… Like they have one stock, at least.

Ryan Isaac:
Five bucks, yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
Okay. I’d say it’s higher than that, I’d say it’s like 40%.

Jake Elm:
Yeah. As of 2021, the data says about 56%.

Matt Mulcock:
Okay.

Ryan Isaac:
Okay.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
So the majority of adults are, they have some form of money in public stocks in the stock market.

Jake Elm:
Yeah. So you could look at that as a glass half full or glass half empty type of thing, right?

Ryan Isaac:
Half.

Jake Elm:
About half of Americans are invested in stocks, but that means the other half are not.

Matt Mulcock:
Yesterday. I would’ve had glass half full ’cause it was the longest day of the year. [laughter] But now I’m…

Ryan Isaac:
Everything was roses yesterday.

Matt Mulcock:
Now I’m actually gonna look to other side. Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
You’re sad today ’cause now it’s all downhill from here.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. I’m looking at the 44%.

Ryan Isaac:
So the main… Like where this is going is, maybe a little bit about what is it as a mechanism, like what is even the market? That might… We’ve covered that a lot in the past, but that’s probably part of this. Another part of this is why, right? That’s the main question today why, and more specifically why is it helpful to dentists specifically?

Matt Mulcock:
Yep.

Ryan Isaac:
Why is it a good asset class for dentists to participate in? I’m curious before we kind of jump into this. What… And so right now, June, 2022 are we still officially in a bear market or has it popped back up?

Matt Mulcock:
No.

Jake Elm:
Yeah, I believe so.

Matt Mulcock:
Bear market.

Jake Elm:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
So bear market.

Matt Mulcock:
The S&Ps, yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
S&P as a… Yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
S&P is down 23% on the year, I think.

Jake Elm:
Yep. We are about 21% on the year.

Ryan Isaac:
Okay.

Jake Elm:
As of today.

Ryan Isaac:
Bear market which happens about every four to five years over the last century and the S&P down 20%. So that’s why it’s on everybody’s mind, we’re coming out of all the COVID stuff, we’re increasing interest rates for the first time in a long time to some pretty high rates that we haven’t seen in a while. There’s someone in here in the room right now that remembers really high rates. So this is… These aren’t high rates yet. [laughter] But they’re higher than we’ve seen in a while, talks of recession, we’re paying a lot for gas, inflation is really high. So that’s why this is on people’s minds right now, and because of a lot of these things and probably other reasons stocks are down like we said, and so that’s why this question is on people’s minds.

Matt Mulcock:
This one does feel… I will say, just speaking of that Ryan, this one does feel like the narrative is worse than reality. Like meaning…

Ryan Isaac:
How do you mean?

Matt Mulcock:
I feel like the level of pessimism right now and the… For good or bad or for right or wrong reasons, I feel like we’ve been kind of waiting for this for so long, people have been talking about it for so long.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
And I feel like… And there are things like you said, inflation, stuff going on with the fed.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. For sure.

Matt Mulcock:
War in Ukraine.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
But I’m saying if you look at just what’s happening in the… Again we’ll use the S&P as an example.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
Top line number dropping 23%, that is not that big of a deal, like that happens.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s not uncommon.

Matt Mulcock:
It’s not uncommon at all. But again and I will say, I know there’s like individual stocks, the tech sector’s getting blown up.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
It just, it does feel like right now the narrative and what you’re hearing, it feels like we’re almost down 50% on the market.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Jake Elm:
This is funny, I was talking about this before with some other guys here before I hopped on the pod, and it was making me laugh. There’s a lot of indicators, like you guys mentioned of a recession, right? There are so many people who are bearish, they think recession is coming. But this would be the first recession in history that everyone predicted.

[laughter]

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Jake Elm:
Like I can’t believe.

Ryan Isaac:
Where everyone is like…

Jake Elm:
The only thing that makes me skeptical is that everyone thinks we’re in front of a recession that’s coming. This would be the first in history.

Matt Mulcock:
The most obvious recession ever.

Jake Elm:
The most obvious recession ever.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Jake Elm:
So yeah, I don’t know what to make of it. It’s interesting.

Ryan Isaac:
Well, and I think you’re pointing out something Matt, I think is cool, and it’s very relatable which is, when I think of my dentist, I’m pretty sure that my dentist is not bothered by a bleeding mouth anymore, ’cause they see it every single day, right? As advisors we’re… I’ll speak for myself, but I’m sure you guys feel the same. We’re kind of un-bothered by market movements at this point.

Matt Mulcock:
Yep.

Ryan Isaac:
It just feels like a natural thing that happens like a bleeding mouth.

Matt Mulcock:
Yep, yep.

Ryan Isaac:
[chuckle] Although to me a bleeding mouth doesn’t seem like a natural thing that happens.

Matt Mulcock:
No.

Ryan Isaac:
And I don’t want it to happen, right? But.

Matt Mulcock:
When I floss and a little blood happens with the gums, I almost pass out.

Ryan Isaac:
That’s ’cause you’re not flossing enough.

Matt Mulcock:
No I do. I floss all the time.

Ryan Isaac:
You floss, you’ve…

Matt Mulcock:
I do.

Ryan Isaac:
Daily flosser.

Matt Mulcock:
I’ve got bad gums.

Ryan Isaac:
I’m a nightly flosser.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. I’m a nightly flosser.

Ryan Isaac:
Hollywood has bad gums.

Matt Mulcock:
I do.

Ryan Isaac:
Is that from Tom?

Matt Mulcock:
I think so, I’ve heard it’s genetic, but I also think dentists…

Ryan Isaac:
Thanks Tom.

Matt Mulcock
Just tell me that to make myself feel better.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Okay.

Matt Mulcock:
It’s like don’t worry, you were born with this.

Ryan Isaac:
So what I’m getting at is when you’re in something a lot, it starts to feel really normal. But I like that you just said that Matt because you’re describing that you’re… As normal as these movements feel to you, as normal as it is to be… See the market and be in it and be with all the ups and downs, you still feel all the outside pressure that this time it’s different feeling.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. Yep.

Ryan Isaac:
That everyone always feels and which causes people to make some poor decisions a lot of times, you’re saying basically that you still feel that.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
No matter how normal this is to you, you’re still like, yeah. I feel that this time is different, and it just goes to show that nobody’s immune from the psychological and emotional forces that are at work in such a complex thing. The market is not the economy, the recession is not the stock market, the fed and inflation, that’s not prices of shares of companies. But they’re so intertwined, and it’s so emotional and complex that you’re just saying like, as normal as this is to me normally, because this is my job and my career and I spend so much time in it, I still feel those pressures.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
And I think that’s just a really human thing to kind of acknowledge.

Matt Mulcock:
Well, yeah. And again when I hear people talk about it either on another podcast or people on Twitter or whatever, people I talk to on calls all the time. I talk to dentists all the time and it’s just when I hear them talking, it’s like, man, you would think… If I didn’t see the numbers on the screen, you would think it’s doubly as worse.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
As far as the numbers go.

Ryan Isaac:
Twice as bad as it is actually.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, exactly. Based on how people are talking.

Ryan Isaac:
Well, if you… I’m just… In my mind I’m thinking about this, I wonder if we… If you ask people, “What was the worst feeling right now, interest rates, maybe a looming recession, high inflation, stock markets down, or March, 2020?

Matt Mulcock:
Not even close.

Ryan Isaac:
I think people would say right now.

Matt Mulcock:
What wait, you’d say what?

Ryan Isaac:
I think people would say right now feels worse.

Matt Mulcock:
Oh, feels worse.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
Not for me.

Ryan Isaac:
Feels scarier.

Matt Mulcock:
Not for me.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Not for you ’cause you.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, I know.

Ryan Isaac:
Like technically know.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
But what I’m saying is I think we forget so quickly how these feelings come and go, and they’re kind of always there. The how bad this feels is something that we’ve experienced all the time.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Jake Elm:
Yeah. I wanted to make a comment on that, Ryan, where you said everyone says, oh this time it’s different, we don’t know what’s going to happen in the future, which is true. Every market recession is different, it has its own unique characteristics. So they are different every time but recessions and stock market drops happened for a reason in the past too.

Ryan Isaac:
Oh yeah.

Jake Elm:
Right, times were scary then, people were pessimistic then, it looked like there was no way we were getting out of things back then. And always seems doom and gloom.

Ryan Isaac:
That’s what I’m saying.

Jake Elm:
Up until it isn’t.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Jake Elm:
We just forget…

Ryan Isaac:
Well, we have the…

Jake Elm:
The reasons for those…

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, you forget them and we have the hindsight of now seeing that it worked out. You’re like, so it’s not as scary anymore as the current thing is that’s not worked out yet.

Jake Elm:
Because we don’t know the future yet. We don’t know how it’s gonna work out.

Matt Mulcock:
That’s actually funny though. If you like… ‘Cause dentists, I think came out or going into 2020, March, 2020, we had those conversations.

Ryan Isaac:
Oh yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
It felt like the world was ending.

Ryan Isaac:
Well, I mean it felt… I mean, technically it seemed like it was way worse than some high interest rates or inflation. I mean every, the world checked out.

Matt Mulcock:
People were calling for a literal depression.

Ryan Isaac:
We were done working.

Matt Mulcock:
We were going into depression.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, we were going into depression. I mean, everything was shut down. That does feel worse. But we have the benefit now of seeing how it kind of just, it was fine. I mean for dentists.

Matt Mulcock:
That’s what I’m saying. So to your point, so dentists came out of that across the board, almost, at least clients that we’re working with. Like now we’re talking to them, they are in better positions financially coming out of that than they ever were even before. So to your point, I think now they kind of maybe look back a little bit more with rose colored glasses. Like it wasn’t that bad.

Ryan Isaac:
‘Cause it worked out.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. ‘Cause it worked out.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s just…

Matt Mulcock:
But right now they don’t know what it’s gonna look like. So to your point, I agree. And it feels worse than 2020 for a lot of people.

Jake Elm:
I agree. Yeah. Maybe we just underestimate how much people hate inflation, how much the people just hate seeing that.

Ryan Isaac:
I think we think we hate as human beings… We hate uncertainty, I think that’s it, right?

Matt Mulcock:
Of course. Yeah. Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
There’s probably some fantastic research about it.

Matt Mulcock:
But we hate high gas prices more than uncertainty.

Ryan Isaac:
I hate paying seven bucks a gallon in California.

Matt Mulcock:
That’s top of the list, yeah.

Jake Elm:
I saw a study the other day where it said it was a survey of Americans like list your top concerns currently in the economy and things.

Ryan Isaac:
Gas.

Matt Mulcock:
And inflation was the top by a mile, there was no one even close. It was a mile. And I can’t remember what second was, but inflation is I think at the top of the list.

Matt Mulcock:
Well for dentists specifically, there’s no question. Inflation hurts them way more than a recession. It does.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
They’re not the same as a normal business where they don’t have… Like when inflation hits a, we’ll call it an average business that has some pricing power of their products, right? They can kind of bob and weave with inflation.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Bob and weave it.

Matt Mulcock:
Bob and weave.

Ryan Isaac:
I like serpentining.

Matt Mulcock:
They serpentine with inflation. Right? They can adjust.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
Dentists can’t do that. They don’t have the pricing power if they’re using insurances.

Ryan Isaac:
On the fly like that. Oh yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
Exactly. So inflation, I think kills, hurts a dentist, way more than a recession does.

Ryan Isaac:
I just bought my daughter her favorite number three meal with no onions and a root beer no ice at In-N-Out the other day.

Matt Mulcock:
And?

Ryan Isaac:
It’s like seven and a quarter right now. That used to be a $5 meal.

Matt Mulcock:
Oh yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
Not that long ago.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
That might be California In-N-Out, but I’m just… I was like, you know, that’s some inflation happening.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
On my number three.

Jess Reynolds:
Hey everyone. This is Jess Reynolds with Dentist Advisors. As you know, we are passionate about giving dentists the education and resources they need to make smart financial decisions. We’ve brought you the Dentist Money Show podcast, which has been downloaded over a million times. And we’ve been providing dentists with a premier private wealth management experience for 15 years. Honestly, it’s been great. And now we’re adding to our lineup to help even more dentists get the financial guidance they need. Now, not every dentist is looking for the Cadillac experience that comes with our private wealth management service. So we have introduced a self-paced subscription based planning service called the Dentist Money membership.

Jess Reynolds:
For a monthly fee, Dentist Money members get access to a suite of planning tools, including the innovative elements app, an investing portal, CE approved content and a lot of other cool members only benefits. Plus as a dentist money member, you can pay for one-on-one coaching sessions with a CFP advisor on an as needed basis. To learn more about these features, visit dentistadvisors.com. You can get started right from the website or book a 15 minute demo just to see how it all works. That’s dentistadvisors.com.

Ryan Isaac:
Okay. Matt and Jake. So let’s dive into kind of, we’ve alluded to this briefly a little bit. Let’s talk about these three places where dentists can put money and why this transitions into this idea of the stock market being an ideal place for really, a lot of dentists and a lot of people, like you said earlier, what was the statistic? Almost 60% of adult Americans?

Jake Elm:
About 56%. Yeah. It’s the data as of 2021.

Ryan Isaac:
I mean, there’s a reason for that, there’s pros and cons of trade off, but let’s go through, someone roll us through the three main places again, where dentists can put their money and what that looks like. Let’s walk down the path a little bit of what that looks like, so.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. I mean, I think broadly speaking again, you could get in little offshoots or whatever nuance, but broadly speaking, there’s three areas you can put money. There’s private businesses like a dental practice. There’s the public markets and then there’s real estate. That again, there’s little offshoots of each of those like commodities, crypto, I don’t know.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Subcategories of a lot of those things.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, subcategories, but that’s pretty much the three areas you can put money.

Ryan Isaac:
Okay. So how does that look in… And you, I don’t know if you wanna share. You kind of have a recent experience of a common conversation of a client not knowing or assuming that they’re under allocated in one of those places and then you showing them some data that we keep on clients for everybody.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
And he was like, “Wow. That was really… ” We’ll get to that in a second. Okay. So a typical practice owner, a typical dentist really… Well, actually you tell the story, ’cause this sets up exactly how most dentist’s balance sheets look. Well, tell that story a little bit. It’s really…

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. So I just had a recent conversation.

Ryan Isaac:
Super common.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. And this happens all the time. This could literally be like probably any of my clients.

Ryan Isaac:
Weekly. Oh yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
Weekly. So, basically the conversation was like, this conversation around where do I put my money? Right. Or I have extra cash. My practice is doing really well, I’ve got extra liquidity, what should I do with it? Right. And the question came up, which comes up all the time, which is, well, should I be putting it somewhere else other than the stock market? They’ve got a draft going, they’re putting money in on a regular basis into the stock market. Right.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
Through their 401k. And also through…

Ryan Isaac:
They would think of that like, should I diversify?

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. So that literally came up like…

Ryan Isaac:
That was the word.

Matt Mulcock:
Well, should we diversify?

Jake Elm:
Should we be doing something else basically?

Matt Mulcock:
Should we be doing something else?

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. When is the time to do…

Matt Mulcock:
So I said, so we look at data, right. So I said, well, look, let’s pull up your balance sheet and let’s just take a look at, if you feel like we should be diversifying, let’s see where you stand right now. And then that can kind of lead us down this path of maybe you should, maybe you shouldn’t. So I pulled up their balance sheet and on our balance sheet on the software we use, it gives you a pie chart and it just gives you some broad categories, kind of what we already said. It gives you your private businesses, your real estate and basically, your public market investment. Right. And this… We see this all the time, this is a younger dentist, they’re under 40, late 30s, and it was basically two-thirds or more was private business, their practice, and real estate.

Ryan Isaac:
And because they have a home and a building?

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
Okay.

Matt Mulcock:
A home, building, and then their practice.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
That’s like two-thirds of their balance sheet.

Ryan Isaac:
Of their balance sheet.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, so the easy answer was, I looked at that, I said, “Guys, this is your answer, this is what it’s telling you is, you’re not even close to needing to diversify. In fact, it’s opposite of what you think. You actually should be upping your drafts into the market because… ” It was a tiny little sliver in proportion to what they had in private businesses and real estate.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, you’re describing our typical client demographic too.

Matt Mulcock:
Yep.

Ryan Isaac:
And we’ve said this before, most dentists start off this way, you have a home, you have a practice, you might have a building, and that on the balance sheet represents such a large chunk, like you illustrated here, that you… Most dentists really could go the rest of their career just building liquidity in the stock market, brokerage accounts, 401ks, RAs whatever, and by the end of that career, barely have that pie chart evened out.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
Because the equity on the practice keeps growing as the practice grows and debt gets paid down, and same with real estate. So it’s not like it just gets dwarfed by, “Oh no, we have too many stocks.” Or something. And diversification across stocks is a whole other thing too.

Matt Mulcock:
Whole other topic, yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
But you’re describing a really typical balance sheet and asset mix for dentists. So, out of these three choices, some dentists choose, and this is definitely not the majority, some dentists choose to say, “Hey, I’m gonna build majority of my net worth in the practice.” Which means, they’re building a very large enterprise, usually quite a few locations usually, dozens and dozens, if not more than 100 employees in a lot of cases, they’re backing out of clinical. When they have extra cash, there’s not a place for it because they’re hiring as fast as they can get the money, they’re buying more marketing, they’re buying more…

Matt Mulcock:
Equipment.

Ryan Isaac:
Equipment and leasing more spaces, that’s one path, but the path of that person is gonna be very light on real estate, very light on stocks.

Matt Mulcock:
And that can work.

Ryan Isaac:
And that’s total… That’s not right or wrong, that’s just a person who’s choosing to do it. In real estate, people can do the same thing. Although real estate is kind of an interesting one because the dentist who says, “I went 10 years in school, I am half a mill in debt, I’m another million dollars in practice debt or whatever in real estate debt, but I’m gonna do what it takes to have a real estate portfolio big enough that it replaces my perpetual 20 to 25,000 a month spending forever.” That’s a big real estate portfolio, and that is not something that happens on the side, that’s almost another career, so that person… I mean good for you, that’s great, but that is gonna be almost…

Matt Mulcock:
It’s a career.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s gonna be a career choice, as much as the dozen practice location is a career choice and the practice will probably suffer and liquidity won’t be as high.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
But for the majority of dentists who aren’t going down either one of those polarizing paths of giant practice or huge real estate, then that’s why the stock market becomes this thing that’s kind of the default of, “Here’s where money goes.” And it’s kind of… And it’s the no-brainer because it’s not gonna go to these other places.

Matt Mulcock:
And really quick, I think you just made a good point on the default, the word default. I think, because they think that like, “Oh, this is the default.” They’re just thinking like, “What else is there?”

Ryan Isaac:
That it’s done.

Jake Elm:
It is not super exciting.

Matt Mulcock:
It’s not exciting.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Jake Elm:
Like what their friends are talking about some other investment opportunities and there’s obviously…

Ryan Isaac:
Cause it’s a default.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Jake Elm:
Intriguing nuance and complexity to it that it doesn’t have that aspect of it.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
You’re totally right, that’s a really good point, that it becomes this thing that was the default, but therefore, must mean that it’s not as optimal.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
But that couldn’t be further from the truth.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, ’cause I have clients even will be like, “Alright, now I’ve got this extra money, I know what you’re gonna say, where I should put it.”

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
They’re thinking like, it’s the default. I’m like, “Yeah, I am gonna say this, but there’s a reason behind this, which is what we’re gonna get to. There’s a reason why we’re saying this is a great asset class for where you are in your life.”

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, unless your paths are like we just described, where you’re gonna build a very large dental practice, or you’re gonna go down the path of career real estate, then yeah, that is the place where the money goes, but it’s built for that.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
That’s the whole purpose.

Jake Elm:
Yes, there are pros and cons to every type of right investment and asset class, and different people with different personalities will kind of gravitate to one or the other, there’s no one way to build wealth, but we really do believe that the stock market is an awesome place, especially for dentists to build wealth. There’s a lot of great benefits of investing in stocks.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, so the name of your the article, Jake, you wrote an article.

Matt Mulcock:
Shout out. Shout out.

Ryan Isaac:
Everybody knows the blog.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Jake Elm:
Sure, maybe.

Matt Mulcock:
Money talks baby.

Ryan Isaac:
Okay, so the name… What’s this? Why stocks, money talks blog.

Jake Elm:
Yeah, I just came up with a list of just some benefits of investing in stocks and why it’s an appealing asset class.

Ryan Isaac:
Okay.

Jake Elm:
So we can just go down through the list. I wanna see what your guys’s thoughts on this.

Ryan Isaac:
Let’s hit it. I like it. Yeah.

Jake Elm:
So the first one I put here is I think an underrated aspect of investing in the stock market, and that’s the liquidity side of things, where as opposed to other investments, let’s talk about your dental practice, where if you needed the liquidity from that, you’d have to try and find a buyer, it could take weeks to months to try to find that, same with real estate.

Matt Mulcock:
Or you have to re-leverage it, right? You could get money out of your practice, but it would require a leverage debt.

Jake Elm:
Sure. Same with a house, right?

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, yeah.

Jake Elm:
Or any property, that you can leverage it or something like that. Even, I know some people are like, “Hey, I get… I have a lot of cash. Let’s pay off some debt with it, let’s make a huge, big extra debt payment.” Let’s say you run into some trouble down the road or an emergency or whatever, you want…

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, to re-leverage something.

Jake Elm:
Or you can’t call back the debt service and be like, “Hey… ”

Ryan Isaac:
Say nevermind.

Jake Elm:
Yeah, nevermind.

Matt Mulcock:
0:25:37.2 MM: Can I have my money back actually.

Jake Elm:
Can I get this contribution back? So yeah, with the stock market, depending on what type of investment account you’re using, you can get to that money fairly easily within a couple of days.

Ryan Isaac:
Oh, yeah.

Jake Elm:
I just think that’s a huge benefit for people…

Ryan Isaac:
It’s gigantic.

Jake Elm:
Looking for flexibility and optionality in their career.

Ryan Isaac:
One of the reasons that stocks can… Even though they’re relatively a very high return, one of the highest returning asset classes, especially for the effort and exchange of time and money and effort, is because it’s liquid. You pay a price for liquidity, if you go fund some private project, someone’s startup company and you give them a 100 grand, you don’t have the privilege of just taking that back, you don’t even have the privilege of taking that back if you put that into your practice for growth. You hired some team, you put in some equipment, you start a new marketing program, you can’t go back to your practice and be like, “Give me 100 grand, I need it, or give me 50 of that.”

Ryan Isaac:
There’s a cost to having constant 24/7 liquidity, and that cost is a little bit of return. That’s the price, but that is such an important trade-off, especially Matt, when you were telling the story, which is a typical story of most dentist’s balance sheets are heavily weighted, well over half, usually closer to two-thirds are weighted towards private business because of the practice and real estate before they even have any liquidity. The cost of not having liquidity is really high. And I mean, that’s not to… I guess I’m just saying that’s not to be overlooked. That’s not a little thing about the stock market.

Matt Mulcock:
No.

Jake Elm:
I think it’s huge.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s gigantic.

Matt Mulcock:
Well, we’ve seen this too. Like we’ve talked about this a lot, where the mindset of a dentist, and just people in general, but that your mindset changes a lot when you don’t have liquidity versus when you do.

Ryan Isaac:
Oh yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
You don’t, you might not, let’s say, you’ve got $10,000 in a brokerage account. Your mindset is so different with how you make decisions, with how you approach the business…

Ryan Isaac:
It changes everything.

Matt Mulcock:
Your debt versus fast forward, maybe two, three years, you’ve got a couple $100,000 sitting in a brokerage account.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
Completely different mindset.

Ryan Isaac:
Does the sports analogy work when it’s like you already have four rings and you’re going for your fifth or you have zero and you’re going for your first? Is the pressure different like having liquidity?

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
Or is it the opposite with rings? [laughter]

Jake Elm:
Sure, ask Steph Curry. You know the golden state warriors just won another championship. Their fourth one.

Ryan Isaac:
More confidence.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Jake Elm:
I did wanna bring up one thing with liquidity is that we list this as a pro, which I think it is a very big one, but I do think it’s also a double edged sword, can be a con.

Ryan Isaac:
Yes.

Jake Elm:
The reason that, because it is so liquid that people have a tendency to panic or oversell and get outta the market.

Ryan Isaac:
‘Cause you can.

Jake Elm:
Which is harmful to long term returns, but you can, and so I do think it is funny, it’s a double edged sword is awesome but it can be harmful.

Ryan Isaac:
It is the downfall.

Jake Elm:
The reason some other investments perform really well over time is ’cause it’s hard to get outta them and people hold them for long periods of times.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
Jake, you gave a statistic last weekend when we were speaking to an awesome group guiding leaders out in California. You gave a statistic of the best performing accounts are accounts held by what group of people?

Jake Elm:
Yeah, I think Fidelity did this study. It was like a while ago, like 10 years ago. And it said, yeah, the best performing accounts are ones where the account owner is dead or had forgotten their account existed.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. So all you gotta do is die.

Ryan Isaac:
And you’ll get, you’ll get…

Matt Mulcock:
You don’t have an estate plan in place and you’ll have an incredible return.

Ryan Isaac:
So number one reason why the stock market is really good for dentists is liquidity.

Jake Elm:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
And I mean, we could have multiple episodes about what are the circumstances when a dentist calls and needs money that they weren’t planning on needing? It’s like endless. You know.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
And constant.

Jake Elm:
We could have a whole podcast on that, but I have more ready for the second one.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Second, number two.

Jake Elm:
Next one on the list is the diversification piece of this, right. Which we’ve mentioned briefly kind of earlier on the podcast, but when you invest in stocks, you’re able to invest in different companies that are different sizes in different sectors, across different countries. And you can be diversified with as little or as much money as you want.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Jake Elm:
That’s just a lot different from having your own private business, which will succeed or fail based on your own efforts or like cryptocurrency.

Ryan Isaac:
Oh yeah.

Jake Elm:
Which is basically like a large, you know, fluctuates like large tech stock or an investment property that may be subject to local market conditions or interest rates or something like that. The stock market allows you to spread your risk out, be diversified, which we were talking about earlier for a dentist trying to have that diversification piece, I think is really helpful.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Jake Elm:
And nice.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s hard to do in other asset classes.

Jake Elm:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
You think that if you’re a real estate investor, I mean, you’re bound to that location where you’re buying a piece of property in most cases, and to diversify across like, oh, well I’ll just… I’ll have like a lot of residential rentals and then a lot of commercial.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. It’s that easy. Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
And then a lot of farmland and then a lot of rental space. It’s like…

Matt Mulcock:
It’s like, I’m just gonna get into real estate. It’s just easy. I’m just gonna get into it.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s tough. I mean, it’s hard to diversify. It’s hard to diversify a dental practice. I mean, you are at the mercy of your local town and demographics and local competition. I mean, you can’t just diversify your way out of the giant DSO that opened up next door. So yeah diversification is… And it’s never been easier to do through different funds and expenses are super low and there’s just, it’s such an easy thing to do. And that’s, and I think that’s where people know that word. I mean, Matt, your clients were asking the same thing. Like shouldn’t we diversify? Because people hear that word, but I don’t think people really understand how diversification’s really working in their lives. And they kind of usually do see it as like, well, I have stocks, so that’s one thing.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. I was just gonna say that.

Ryan Isaac:
So I need like, I… Shouldn’t I have like some gold bricks and then I should get some crypto and then I should have a bunch of houses and then I should have some farmland and then I should fund some startups and you’re like. No, you could only have one brokerage account and be incredibly diversified and have like, you could lease your office building, you could be a career associate, you could rent a town home or a house, never own any of that stuff and still be incredibly diversified across every penny you ever save just in the stock market. And it’s a huge, very powerful tool.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. I think this is… I know there’s more we’re gonna get to but I’m gonna say it right now. I think this is the biggest benefit.

Ryan Isaac:
That’s the bigger one for you?

Matt Mulcock:
For sure. Yeah. I mean, it’s just everything you guys just said.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s huge.

Matt Mulcock:
Specifically for a dentist too, even more so for a dentist ’cause of what we just said, that they already have so much exposure to their private business. And then real estate, this is such a huge benefit and it’s so simple for them to do. It’s so simple.

Jake Elm:
Yeah, I do think that’s a great point where a lot of people think, okay, I have an investment account. They view that as just one asset or one thing. But inside that investment account, you are literally…

Matt Mulcock:
Thousands.

Ryan Isaac:
By the thousands.

Jake Elm:
If you’re diversified, you’re literally owning thousands of different companies across different sectors across the world, which is the definition of diversification.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. What did Cliff Asness say that, diversification is the only free lunch in existence.

Ryan Isaac:
Woah.

Matt Mulcock:
Something like that.

Ryan Isaac:
Expound.

Jake Elm:
Good.

Matt Mulcock:
Just saying like the whole idea of there’s no free lunch.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
Cliff Asness world class investor, said like that was, he said, “You might believe that, there’s no such thing as a free lunch, but diversification truly is the only free lunch there is.”

Ryan Isaac:
‘Cause it does exactly what you, what it’s supposed to do.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
And it’s like…

Matt Mulcock:
It’s so easy.

Ryan Isaac:
Free to do.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, yeah. It doesn’t cost you extra to be hyper concentrated in one stock or one sector, one part of the world versus diversification across all of it. I mean, it doesn’t cost you extra. That’s cool. It’s the only free lunch.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Jake Elm:
Okay. Can we hit on the next one? This one’s a little more fun, I think, than diversification, tends to get a little bit boring.

Matt Mulcock:
I like getting fun.

Jake Elm:
This is the one that people like, which is historically stocks that provided higher returns, pretty much anything in the upper asset classes.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. I’m thinking back to so many episodes with Reece. He would hit on this so hard. I mean the thing that especially, okay. We’re again, we’re recording this middle of 2022. We’re in a bear market in the S&P, we’re on the verge of the most predictable recession ever [laughter] as you were saying earlier.

Jake Elm:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
Recession that our government’s like…

Matt Mulcock:
How dare you say right now I’m getting good returns.

Ryan Isaac:
Purposely putting us into.

Jake Elm:
I’m gonna zag and take the other stance just because I’ll go… I’ll be the anti recession guy, just because everyone thinks we’re going the wrong way.

Ryan Isaac:
You’ll say, no, we don’t know. What I was gonna say is, the highest return… One of the highest returning asset classes, it literally is.

Jake Elm:
It is.

Ryan Isaac:
The… And people will be like, well, you know… In the last few years, real estate has crushed everything. The homes we live in. But historically, real estate appreciation is closer to what historical inflation rates are, which is not like today, [laughter] 9%. Real estate returns only match what equities will do over long periods of time when it’s debt free rental real estate, that you’re not the tenant of. So you’re building that…

Matt Mulcock:
That passive income?

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. You wanna start down that road?

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. Don’t get me going.

Ryan Isaac:
Matt’s getting red in the face. He said passive. We might get there, but yeah, it historically is one of the highest returning… And if you added liquidity diversification, low barrier to entry, costs, you can be an investor with 50 bucks. You can fully outsource it. You can get… If you add those back in, maybe it’s the highest returning asset class for the input. What did you say return on?

Jake Elm:
Return on hassle, which is kind of… That’s the last point.

Ryan Isaac:
Effort? On hassle. Okay. Let’s hit that then. Number four, you say it.

Jake Elm:
So I like this thing. Everyone talks about return on investment. ROI is a big thing that people talk about, but there’s this other term called return on hassle, which I think stocks…

Ryan Isaac:
Did you coin that?

Jake Elm:
Oh, no way. There’s no way I’m smart enough for that, but I’ve heard someone…

[laughter]

Matt Mulcock:
It’s exactly what I always say. Like I find a quote or something I drop. I’m like, this is no way an original thought. I steal everyone.

Ryan Isaac:
I couldn’t have thought of that. Return on hassle?

Jake Elm:
Yes. So the idea is like, if you wanna do a calculation here. The amount of money or the return you’ll get, and you divide that by the time, effort, money, or stress that takes to achieve those returns.

Ryan Isaac:
Stress, the lost sleep, the years off your life?

Jake Elm:
Yeah. So, let’s say you have an investment that returns a lot of money, but let’s say it’s just a piece of work and it takes a lot of time and hours and stress. And it’s like, is that truly better that maybe a lower returning asset that you don’t have to think about that you don’t have to put any work in? I just think it’s a good question to ask yourself in investment…

Ryan Isaac:
Well, yeah. When you’re talking about an asset class that already is one of the highest returning asset classes, just period and the return on hassle.

Matt Mulcock:
That coincides just what we were talking about with the passive income where I get heated on, I don’t care. I don’t really get heated, but just as…

Ryan Isaac:
No. You don’t get heated.

Matt Mulcock:
It does coincide with that whole idea of people that misuse or miss, that they… Like they say passive income as if it’s just something that you just can go get.

Ryan Isaac:
Like a bunch of people are out there investing in things and they just consciously chose not to get a passive income investment?

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
You should have gone down the passive aisle. Did you miss it? Like it was aisle three, the passive investment.

Matt Mulcock:
It’s literarily like flashing lights right there.

Ryan Isaac:
They have all the big signs and you went down the non passive aisle, dummy.

Matt Mulcock:
This is passive income.

Jake Elm:
People have a hard time distinguishing between, let’s say, an investment and just a second job. It’s like, what you’re really getting into is just a second job. And so I think one of the benefit is if you’re diversified more of a passive, systematic, long term investor, it’s not super exciting maybe as some of those other investments, but it more than makes up for it in the free time it provides. To go to the beach with your family and do what you want and not have to put so much time and effort into that.

Ryan Isaac:
Totally, man. And I mean to wrap, to take this back, the question of your blog post is, Why stocks? And that’s what we were getting at today was, why is this an asset class that really for the majority of dentists who aren’t building giant multi-location practices or huge real estate portfolios, which is its own career. And so that’s like everybody else, these are… This is exactly why it’s the perfect place for me to put money.

Ryan Isaac:
We were saying this earlier, it feels like the default. So it feels kind of lame, who wants the default? I want the thing I chose. But it’s there, but it is like, it is the best place for your extra money. So if you’ve taken care of your practice growth and liquidity, you have your family’s emergency fund, you have cash on hand for anything you gotta spend soon, like a down payment or some expense you have coming up and you’re listening to this and you’re sitting there like your clients did ask you about, “Hey, we’re sitting on money. Where should this go?” There’s a lot of places it can go, but this is the place where it should go. For all of these reasons and more we probably didn’t even cover. And you just keep doing that and you keep doing that. And, yeah. Go ahead.

Matt Mulcock:
Well, and I think COVID made this mindset worse of this whole idea of using the term average returns negatively. Who would want average returns in some default investment? But it’s like…

[laughter]

Ryan Isaac:
It’s average for returns in the default investment.

Matt Mulcock:
In the default investment, like who…

Ryan Isaac:
It’s kind of like the… When you play a video game and the default little cart that you get to drive.

Matt Mulcock:
It’s like, who would want that?

Ryan Isaac:
You want the custom one that you get to pick different wheels and…

Matt Mulcock:
Exactly.

Ryan Isaac:
Engines and stuff.

Jake Elm:
Can I give a quick data point on this, because I just… I like statistics. If you take a look back at the US stock market, like since 1920, the worst 30 year period ever, in that portfolio was an 8% annual return. It was from 1928 to 1950.

Ryan Isaac:
It was the worst rolling 30.

Jake Elm:
Anyway, if you just had 8%, that was the worst ever. So that not bad, 8% annually actually adds up to about 900. It’s a 900% total return over 30 years.

Matt Mulcock:
So that’s exactly what I was gonna say is like this whole idea of average returns being used negatively. But if you take… If you get average returns for an uncommon amount of time, let’s say 30 years, you are a multi, multi, multi multimillionaire.

Ryan Isaac:
Well, how…

Matt Mulcock:
Especially if you’re adding to that every single year. Eight to 10% rate of return for a 30 year period.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s huge.

Matt Mulcock:
And you’re adding the amount of money that dentists can add. There’s nothing else you need to do.

Ryan Isaac:
No.

Matt Mulcock:
That default option just made you very wealthy.

Ryan Isaac:
Somebody said that… I know there’s a smart quote around this somewhere, but think of all the people that have accomplished great things and really successful people in life, the common denominator for most of that is they’ve done average things for an uncommonly long period of time. I mean, who said that? Wasn’t that…

Matt Mulcock:
Morgan Housel talks about it.

Ryan Isaac:
Morgan Housel talks about that.

Matt Mulcock:
Warren Buffet. His secret is invest… No, his skill is investing, but his secret is time.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. It’s just, you do average things for a longer period of time than most of your peers who will drop out and stop doing those things because it’s not fun to do things for a longer period of time. We’re not built that way. That’s the secret sauce.

Matt Mulcock:
And you could apply that quote to dentist. Your skillset is dentistry, but your secret is time. And it’s an open secret. You do this for 30 years, you’re going to be very wealthy.

Ryan Isaac:
Well, think about, man, we work with all kinds of practices and owners and careers out there, but some of the best clients we work with, they don’t have… There’s nothing super unique about them, about their practice or their career, what they did. They just did some… Good average stuff for a long period of time.

Jake Elm:
They just showed up to work every day.

Ryan Isaac:
And they just crushed it. Like the basics of customer service, the basics of leading a team, the basics of good P&L management, the basics of good marketing. But they did those basics for a really long period of time. And it’s like, well, there you go. You’re a multi multimillionaire because of that stuff.

Matt Mulcock:
I’ve got another quote, it’s like literarily coming out. I’m sorry.

Ryan Isaac:
Please do, say it if you want to. Well this, and then you have another update from the dad’s…

Matt Mulcock:
Oh, I gotta get that out.

Ryan Isaac:
Solstice text chain.

Matt Mulcock:
But just to summarize what you were just saying is James Clear, him and Morgan Houser are like our…

Ryan Isaac:
Quote machines.

Matt Mulcock:
Quote machines. He really… They really are.

Ryan Isaac:
That’s all they do.

Matt Mulcock:
But just to sum up what you just said, James Clear wrote relatively recent it’s 90% of success is doing the obvious things for an uncommon amount of time.

Ryan Isaac:
That was it.

Matt Mulcock:
That’s it.

Ryan Isaac:
That was the one I was thinking of.

Matt Mulcock:
And that truly is, you’re just doing things that we all know that you should be doing. Pick the default option, pick the average returns. Just do it for a long time.

[laughter]

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Anyway, that’s perfectly said. Okay. Let’s… We’ll just say thank you for everyone for tuning in, thanks Jake for being here with us on the panel.

Jake Elm:
This was so great.

Ryan Isaac:
For writing the blog. That’s money talks.

Jake Elm:
Money talks.

Ryan Isaac:
Money talks, Jake Elm.

Matt Mulcock:
Check it out. It’s great. It really is.

Ryan Isaac:
He’s been writing for like two years, so he’s got a few blogs under his belt and if you have any questions for us, we would highly encourage you, we’d love to hear from you, go to dentistadvisors.com, click on the ‘book free consultation’ link, and schedule a chat with one of our friendly advisors. Matt is gonna close us out with an update. This is the most recent text from big Tom mountain on the Winter Solstice.

Matt Mulcock:
Again, this was yesterday. He gave me the quote I already read and then literally the next day.

Ryan Isaac:
Okay.

Matt Mulcock:
He just wanted to… Just to…

Ryan Isaac:
Reiterate?

Matt Mulcock:
Double check, reiterate to us.

Ryan Isaac:
Well, yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
What’s going on. So he says [laughter], “As you’ve all probably noticed… ” Of course you did. That was my little note.

Ryan Isaac:
Okay.

Matt Mulcock:
“As you’ve all probably noticed the day is going to be a little shorter than yesterday. We’re on the downward slide.”

Ryan Isaac:
Dang.

Matt Mulcock:
He just wanted to make sure that we knew that.

Ryan Isaac:
Just to let you know. And just to let you know. Thanks Tom. We appreciate it. Thanks, Matt and Jake, thanks to all of you. We’ll catch you next time on another episode of The Dentist Money Show. Take care now. Bye-bye.

[music]

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